. joining me now is ann thompson, lee at st. patrick's cathedral in new york city, of course, and nbc vatican analyst george weigel is here with me, and we begin with claudio. you were shocked by this. people in st. peter's square didn't even know that it was happening. tell us what happened. >> no, they didn't, andrea. we came around here after the shocking news, and all the cameras came down, and what the tourists saw is what's going on. everybody was just wandering around st. peter's square like it was a normal day, of course, and when we told them that the pope was abdicating they were shocked. they couldn't even -- they didn't even know that a pope could abdicate, as a matter of fact. in a way money knew in a way because the last pope that did that was about 700 years ago. it was in 1294. it seemed like it was impossible in modern times, but pope benedict xvi hinted that in 2010 and a mof times after that that if he felt that his strength wasn't such that he could carry on the very important duties of a pope, that he would think about it at least, but nobody saw that coming. this